


Her Name Was Julia

by madelion



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Family, Kids, Other, and then he taako and merle essentially adopt ango and so, angus has her smile, deals with adoption, julia just wants the best for her son ango, magnus always wanted a family i think
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-27
Updated: 2017-09-16
Packaged: 2018-12-07 20:50:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11631639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/madelion/pseuds/madelion
Summary: Julia gives birth to a little boy and names him Angus. She decides to travel Faerun and when she comes back she meets her father's new apprentice Magnus. Years later Magnus finally learns why he’s always recognized Angus' smile.





	1. Chapter 1

She’s nineteen when she learns she’s pregnant. It’s after she has to run from working in the forge to puke in the toilet, after remembering that she hasn’t gotten her period in two months, after realizing that maybe she should take a proper test, and realizes maybe it’s not a fluke.

She throws it away immediately after seeing the positive sign. Because who is she going to show it to?

Definitely not _him_. Because she’s never going to tell him he’s a father. There’d be no point.

And she wants to tell her father because god knows Steven Waxman would help her in every way and cherish his grandbaby to the ends of the earth. A part of her knows this and yet despite that, she waits and she waits because it’s not the right time. Not yet.

She’s nineteen and she knows that her own mother was her age when she was pregnant with her for goodness sake but this is different. Julia wants to see the world. And right now the only thing she sees is her stomach slowly growing bigger.

It makes her want to cry out in frustration.

 

“You think you be alright by yourself for a few months?” Steven asks one night while they’re sitting on the porch watching the sunset.

Her mouth feels dry, “Oh?”

“It’s just,” he starts, tilting his chair back and looking up at the sky, “there’s a contracting job down in Suttonville that pays well. I know you’d be able to look after the shop and forge while I’m gone no problem but it’s awhile chickadee and I wanted to check-”

“Dad,” Julia cuts him off with a look and a hand on his arm. “Take the job. I’ll be fine.”

She waves him off and promises to write as often as she can. And the tremble in her voice as she yells, “Goodbye,” is because now she truly has no one to tell. She can’t tell him now because this job is important to him, and if he learned she was pregnant he’d be back in Ravensroost immediately.

“Looks like it’s just you and me now,” Julia whispers to herself and slowly puts her hand on her stomach.

It’s not that she doesn’t want this baby. One day Julia wants to be blessed with a partner and family of her own, and to be ever so happy. With babies that have her smile and her partner’s eyes.

But she’s nineteen. And everything a nineteen year old is. Immature and wise beyond her years at the same time, but filled especially with the longing to see the world, to experience life in the vast expanse of the world before bringing a new one into it. And so she decides, no, her father won’t know about the baby. No one will. She contacts families who are willing to adopt and promises her child will have a good life, perhaps even better than the one she could provide.

The people in town talk. Of course they do- but she makes it clear that the gossip will end when her pregnancy does. That this is not going to be a baby of Ravensroost, it is a baby of Rockport when it’s born.

She keeps the forge open as long as she truly can- when her dresses are bursting at the seems and she can barely see over her belly, Julia can still be found in the forge hammering away at the sword the Johnstons ordered last week.

\---

And she’s twenty now.

Julia is twenty and giving birth to her son in the middle of her bedroom with only her best friend and her midwife Rose to help her stay sane.

“Julia, honey, you can do this just give it one more push and you’ll be free of the little devil,” Alex whispers into her ear, pressing a kiss on her forehead.

“Remember when you fell off the monkey bars and broke your leg? This is nothing compared to that. We had to reset it without a cleric and you braved your way through that.”

“I- I can’t,” Julia whimpers, “I’m too tired, I can’t-”

It’s two weeks earlier than she was expecting and she hasn’t planned for any of this.  Not that she was able to plan this baby at all but she had definitely not planned for twenty plus hours of labor.

“Julia, c’mon you got this,” says the midwife.

And she thinks oh, well, what the hell. And less than a minute later her thoughts are accompanied by loud wailing, and Alex saying happily, “You have a son- Julia you got a little baby boy.”

_He’s not mine_ , she thinks, _he can’t be mine_. 

But Rose places him a moment later into Julia’s arms, wrapped up in a blanket and just so small, compared to, well, compared to everything. And he’s still wailing although now he’s getting quieter and his nose scrunches up a little and he’s just _perfect_. And it makes her think.

Nine months of carrying him around, being frustrated with him every time she couldn’t get up on her own (even though it wasn’t his fault), all the times she longed to get out of Ravensroost, all the times she told her daddy that he didn’t need to come home and visit her, all of it floods back to her and makes her wonder if it was what one needed to do so you could enjoy the next stage. Because looking down at him, she realizes she’d do it again if she got to keep him in her life somehow.

“Oh gosh,” whispers Alex. “He’s a beaut... Julia, look at me honey.”

And Julia looks at her with small tears in her eyes, knowing full well they’re both thinking of how in two days time he’s gonna be in Rockport living with his new family.

“You’re both gonna be fine.” 

She nods. Because they will. They’ll be fine.

Several hours later when she’s been stitched up, and the baby’s been washed by Rose, and Alex has left food for her on her bedside table, she lays there in the half-light of evening and holds her baby’s hand on her bed.

“You need a name little one,” she whispers.

He yawns as if he can hear her and is his way of agreeing. A grin spreads across her face. In this moment, in the time before sunset she’ll allow herself to fall in love with him. Every aspect.

“It’s an awful lot of responsibility... naming another human being but you seem to understand that so I’ll just let you help,” murmurs Julia. “What about James? That’s a seemingly okay name to go with the last name McDonald.”

Nothing. In fact, his face seems to scrunch up even more as if to say, _No, no don’t be silly_.

“Okay, uh, maybe something with two syllables... I’ll keep thinking.”

And she suggests names, and she knows none of them are right, but she can’t come up with the proper one yet. But as she slowly shifts him into his cot and presses a kiss on his forehead it’s like the name is whispered into her ear by fate herself and so she says softly, “Goodnight Angus.”

And he yawns.


	2. Angus McDonald

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Julia brings fresh baby faced Angus to his new family.

Steven Waxman is coming back home in Ravensroost in two days time, and Julia has a day old baby to deliver before he gets back.

She settles herself comfortably on the train, or as comfortably as one can after having a baby practically the day before, with Angus wrapped up in his soft yellow blanket. He is surprisingly easy, except for when they had gotten out of the taxi cab and she had almost tripped while carrying him. He did not hold back with screams and tears until she started singing a lullaby to him.

Now nestled up against her chest, his tiny fingers barely grasping at the blanket’s edge, Angus sighs and all thoughts of the screaming baby from an hour before goes out the window.

“Tea or coffee, Madam?”

Her gaze shifts from watching Angus’s nose scrunch up in his sleep, to the elf smiling at her with the trolley of drinks and snacks.

“Oh I’m fine.” 

She’s fine.

She watches the countryside fly by and slowly shifts Angus so that she can use the table in front of her to start the letter. He won’t be her son. She won’t visit him, or ask his new parents to contact her, but she _will_ be his biological mother. And just in case his parents aren’t everything they seem to be, in case they fail him worse then she would have, she’d like him to know some things.

Firstly, she loves him.

She had knitted the blanket he’s nestled in during sleepless nights, using some of the softest yarn she’d ever bought, and although she isn’t one for knitting, it felt like something she needed to do. Julia had been raised with the stories of Istus who knitted the story of fate into a blanket or scarf or whatever she was feeling that day. It means she can leave him something physical to hold onto.

She didn’t knit his name into it because she didn’t know what he would be called, but while she had slept, Alex had stitched it into it for her.

“Kid needs to know who gave his name to him right?” she had laughed and kissed Julia on the cheek before sending her off in the taxi.

Secondly, she wishes she could have provided him a life in Ravensroost.

She makes that clear in the letter.

 _Will his handwriting be like mine,_ she wonders. _Or completely different._

She suspects his hair will be like hers, and his eyes are that of his biological grandfather's. She tells him how he came to be and about things she loves and when she’s done writing about her life and experiences with him while she was pregnant it’s two whole pages.

Thirdly, he is amazing.

She writes, ‘ _Whatever you do, I will always be proud of you. I’m sure whatever wit you have will be applied towards something incredible, but make sure to be kind and genuine with those you surround yourself with.’_

Julia yawns. She’s almost finished, it’s close to three pages now but before she puts her pen away she writes one last thing.

_I’m writing this on a train as I take you to the Mcdonalds. Your family! I find something about trains so mesmerizing. Maybe it’s because any type of story can take place on a train. Murder mysteries that keep you on the edge of your seat, coming of age stories of a protagonist, or even tales where the journey results in a new family in a new city._

_Take heart Angus._

_Love, Julia_

\---

Mrs. McDonald weeps tears of joy when Julia knocks on the door with her bundle of blankets in arm. Angus has been awake for the past half an hour, looking up at Julia intensely with his eyes, as if trying to memorize her features.

She knows he’s been staring at her for that long because she’s been staring back, trying to memorize _his_ features.

“Oh my, you must be Julia, come in dear, come in!” says Mrs. McDonald, who waves her hand in beckoning her.

They sit in the kitchen where the sun dances across the plants and cooking books on the far wall, and Julia slowly eases Angus out of her arms into his-

Into his mother’s arms.

He fusses a little as she does, but ultimately lets himself be held by Mrs. McDonald, who insists upon calling her Petranella (which makes Julia stare at the wall a little because that can _not_ be a real name). Petranella, however, is a nice woman who looks at Angus with a curiosity and fondness that comforts Julia.

“Well, I must be going. I don’t want to intrude,” says Julia in her fanciest voice after finishing her cup of tea, because she’s starting to see the class Petranella imbues surrounded by the riches of this house. “Um... I left a letter in the blanket for Angus. I- I know we won’t be in contact but I was hoping that he could open it on his tenth birthday to read and just... know where he came from.”

Petranella laughs, “Oh- of course. I’ll certainly try to make that happen.”

“Petranella? What are you doing in the kitchen?” a loud voice shouts from upstairs, who Julia suspects is her husband.

“I’m just chatting to Julia dear, she’s come with the baby!” responds Petranella.

“Well do it in the sitting room, there are perfectly good armchairs in there for any guests of ours.”

She is less comforted by Mr. McDonald’s unattached voice that comes from the upstairs. Relocating to another room with more comfortable seats would seem like a kind offer but the tone of voice does not lend any kindness.

If she could translate it would be rather, “Dearest Petranella, you fool, why drink tea in the kitchen sitting next to our baby’s biological mother when you could sit several feet away from her in our huge drafty sitting room while the maid brings in the tea.”

She exits the house, turns around, presses a kiss onto the forehead of Angus McDonald, and thanks Petranella for everything and gets back into the taxi that will take her to the train station.

And as she sits on the train, she wraps her arms around torso to stop any thoughts of why her arms feel empty.

 

_You wanted this. You wanted to have your own life. You couldn’t have both._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Julia loves her baby boy a lot. But she's smart. 
> 
> I love them both even more.


	3. Back Again

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Julia comes back and meets someone who will continue to disrupt her entire life.

When she comes back from Rockport she’s sore, and tired, and emotional and she’s ready to go to sleep. She’s about to collapse on the couch when she sees a dish prepared for her, with a sticky note on it revealing it’s from Alex (the drawn on winky face gives it away) and a picture next to it.

It’s of her and Angus.

Alex must have taken it when they were falling asleep because in the picture Julia is sprawled across the bed on her side eyes closed, with Angus next to her, his little feet and arms spread out into the perfect starfish position. He’s wearing the pajamas she got for him and she notices that his finger is very firmly clamped onto hers while the blanket she knitted for him rests in between them. The waterworks start and Julia is left crying in the kitchen.

  
\---

  
It’s two months after her father comes back when she brings it up.

“I know you just got back but... I was thinking,” suggests Julia one day as they’re both cleaning up the workshop. “And I don’t want you to think I’m abandoning you bu-”

“You wanna go,” interrupts Steven with a twinkle in his eye. “Travel the world and all. Don’t think I forgot twelve year old Julia laying out the map on the kitchen table and pinpointing every city you wanted to visit someday.”

And she wants to laugh out loud because of course he remembers. He’s her father for goodness sake, it’s practically in the job description.

“I think it’s a great idea,” he says later. “Although I’d rather you brought a friend, imagine all the trouble you’d avoid, just to create your own if you went with Alex.”

They leave on a Tuesday morning. And ten months later on a Thursday afternoon, the two of them walk back into town, their shoes worn, their outfits covered with a fine layer of dust, but wide smiles on both of their faces. The idea of being able to fall back into the relative normality of their previous life is comforting to both of them. Also being able to fall back into their own beds. That is very comforting.

And all of that is thrown away when Julia knocks on the door of her house, expecting her father to greet her and hug her, when a tall burly man opens the door.

“Hail and well met, how can I help you?”

She stares at him, caught off guard.

“I- where is my father?” she says almost a little too demandingly.

“Your father? Ohhhhh you must be Julia!”

And he shakes her hand before stepping aside for her to step inside. All while talking. About what, she doesn’t know, because she’s zoned out.

She surveys him up and down for the first time. He’s definitely tall... definitely burly. He looks about her age, and he’s handsome. Very handsome, but not the point. He has a bandage wrapped around his left hand and he’s wearing one of her father’s apron.

“Um- lemme go grab Steven,” he says after sufficient babbling, and he grins at her and leaves.

She gives him a pained smile as he leaves and then turns back to her luggage.

“You could have at least helped me bring these upstairs,” she grumbles to herself as she makes her way upstairs. She doesn’t know why this man is here, and she doesn’t think she’ll like the reason.

  
\---

“I can’t believe you were in Neverwinter when she passed through-” says Steven in awe, as Julia tells him everything that wasn’t in her letters.

“Well yeah, but I didn’t see her. Everyone wanted to hear her music, so I didn’t get a chance to even-” says Julia with a laugh.

“I suppose, but the fact that you were in the same city as Renata is amazing. She’s gotta be one of the best known bards,” says Steven. “Not that I’m biased.”

Julia looks at all the mixtapes with Renata the bard’s music on them in the corner of the living room.

“No, not at all Dad.”

He lets out a hearty laugh and she smiles. Sitting on the couch with him, in front of the fire with a blanket shared between them, she feels like it was all worth it. Not only did she get to see the world, but she got to miss this. There’s nowhere she’d rather be on a Thursday evening-

And then Magnus opens the front door a little too loudly, his whistling taking over the comforting silence as he waltzes into the kitchen area searching.

It would be perfect if he just wasn’t so loud. And if his whistling was just a little quieter, or maybe even non-existent.

Her father had told her that he had taken Magnus on as an apprentice while she was gone. Which, first of all, wasn’t necessary she argued.

“I was only gone for ten months!” she had cried out. “Dad- Papa you don’t need an apprentice.”

“Julia this isn’t about replacing you, it’s about getting someone else to help me run the place and- I know you may not want to admit it but I am getting older,” he’d said comforting. “Besides, Magnus is a fine young man, he’s definitely skilled enough to become a master carpenter and he needed a place.”

Julia hadn’t argued anymore with him. She herself may be unsettled by Magnus, but it was apparent from the way her father talked to him, that there was no getting rid of him.

\---

  
“I think it’s because you were expecting everything to be the same,” says Alex after meeting her at the tea shop the day after. “If you spend ten months thinking, ‘Can’t wait to see Dad, and only Dad when I get back’ and then come home to another person who’s been there for nine months, I think it’s a little surprising.”

“But why didn’t he tell me?” replies Julia. “We wrote letters to each other all the time, and he couldn’t mention just once in nine months, ‘Oh by the way, I got an apprentice.’”

Alex purses her lips at her and smiles comfortingly, “Honestly, I understand why you’re a little surprised, but I don’t think it’s that bad! Besides, he doesn’t seem like a douche or anything.”

Julia bites her lip. That’s true. Everywhere they’ve gone, whether it’s just walking to the tea shop or saying hello to neighbors on the way to market, everyone's been overjoyed to see her and Alex, but almost every single one of them have mentioned Magnus in one way or another.

He’s got the whole town charmed. And for some reason, she can’t stand it.


	4. Butting Heads

Suddenly Julia realizes that it’s been a year since she’s had Angus. She left Ravensroost for ten months, two months after she gave him away and that in total is twelve months. A year. She looks in her diary which catalogued the event and yep, she missed his birthday by a few days. 

She can’t help but wonder if it’s better this way. Because if she had remembered, then she and Alex probably wouldn’t have enjoyed their last few days as much. However, if she could have spent the day with anyone she was glad it was with Alex. Her dearest friend, the one person who she could talk to the situation about with. Someone who fought with her like a sister that resulted in throwing objects, before both of them apologized to each other an hour later. 

It’s silly but she wonders about one year old Angus. She’s back in the forge now a days, working on orders of swords and daggers and the work is a good distraction. She releases her frustration through blows to metal and when she wipes the sweat out of her eyes, her head is more clear than before. Angus can probably walk.

Julia has realized that her father was speaking the truth when he said that Magnus wasn’t a replacement for her. Julia has always preferred the forge and metal work over wood carving, and while her father is skilled in both, Magnus is clearly a skilled carpenter. She has to admit that sometimes she’s impressed. 

But most of the time, Magnus is just a nuisance. And he frustrates her. Which ultimately frustrates her more, because not many people frustrate her. 

It’s a good thing the forge and carpentry area are semi separated because they stumble over each other constantly. Julia can’t remember the last time she’s stepped on a person’s toes this many times or how many times Magnus has almost checked her into a wall because they were both trying to get to the same place at the same time. 

Her father treats Magnus like he treats her, and she thinks back to late night conversations with him about wanting more children, a sibling for her. And she swallows her pride when she remembers this at dinner, when the three of them eat together and Steven smiles wildly at them both, his daughter and his would be son.

Magnus accompanies her to market and talks and talks and annoys her more than she thought possible.

“I don’t get you Julia,” he says one day, tossing an apple between his hands.

She looks up at him and tries not to snort. He doesn’t get her. Well she can relate in that aspect.

“You know if you’re going to toss the apple and bruise it, you’re buying it with your own money,” she says sighing.

He winks at the girl behind the stall and takes it without paying. 

“Why are you like this? You couldn’t just hand her a coin instead of flirting your way through life? You know someday you won’t be able to charm someone and it’ll be your downfall,” she says exasperatedly. 

“Jules, I have rustic hospitality. People love me!” he says cheerily. 

“Don’t call me Jules.” 

She puts her head in her palms and leans against a wall trying to get her head in some shade. It’s one of those days where she just wants to be alone, and the increasing heat isn’t helping.

They’re almost done circling around the market after getting everything Steven has asked for when she hears a whistle come behind her. She turns and sees a group of men looking her up and down, chattering between them. 

And in the middle she sees Kalen, a boy only several years older than her, who apparently feels the need to start catcalling her. 

“Lass, you’re looking fine today,” one of his friends crows loudly. 

She starts to walk past them when Kalen steps in front of her. Directly in front of her, and she can’t help but feel a very small bubble of anxiety block her throat from speaking. Julia Waxmen is a very well known and respected young woman, and she has the biceps and build to keep most men at bay but apparently not Kalen and his friends.

“Get lost Kalen,” she says and tries to step around him. 

He blocks her again, and just grins, his friends joining him in barricading her. 

“Now, Julia, why so rude today. It’s a beautiful day, and I’d love to spend it with someone just as beautiful such as yourself-”

“I don’t have fucking time for this, Kalen let me leave now-” she says a little more vehemently. 

He still won't move but this time he looks behind her instead of creepily staring. And behind her she can sense Magnus walk up behind her and pull himself up to his full 6 ft. 

“She said get lost Kalen, maybe you should listen-”

“Aw Julia I didn’t know you let your little boyfriend talk for you-”

And then she sees fire, and Julia fucking barges through the horde of boys and twists Kalen’s arm behind his back. She took ten years of hand to hand combat classes, and knows how to fight with every sword she’s ever made. She knows how to take care of herself. 

“He’s not my boyfriend,” she hisses. “And you’ll definitely never be my boyfriend so back the fuck off and leave me alone.” 

She lets go of him and marches off, and it isn’t until she’s halfway home that she realized she dropped all the grocery bags and she wants to burst into tears due to frustration. She doesn’t but she does sit on the ground on the side of the dirt road contemplating what to do with watery eyes.

“Hey Julia- Julia you forgot the groceries so I grabb-”

Magnus is back. Great.

“You didn’t need to step in like that back there- I had it handled,” she bursts out angrily, looking past him.

He looks at her, “I- uh ... what?”

“I can fight my own battles Magnus, you don’t need to help me, in fact we’ve been doing great for a long time without you so don’t take it personally if I’m not hopping on your dick like the whole town is apparently,” she yells and gets up and rips the groceries out of his hands.

He looks at her dumbfounded and then frowns. 

“I’m not- I haven’t- What the fuck Julia? What is your problem with me?” he finally shouts. 

She doesn’t think he’s raised his voice in the past few weeks she’s known him and she feels satisfaction settle in her stomach, she’s provoked him successfully.

“Why are you here Magnus?! This isn’t your home- just, just go back to where you came from-” she shouts without looking at him, marching away.

“I don’t know if this has settled into your head Julia, but I’ve lived here for nine months,” he shouts. “This is my home as much as it is yours and I’m not leaving.” 

She whips around and he’s right in front of her now, and she really can’t remember the last time she’s been this angry. “You’ve lived here for nine months- I’ve lived here my entire life! Every birthday, every holiday, every time my father’s grieved over my mother it’s been here, and it’s been with the people here- nine months is nothing compared to twenty one years.”

He looks at her, and says lowly, “Well if I had a home like this I wouldn’t have left it for almost a year to gallivant around the world only to come back and be angry when something changes.”

With that Magnus takes the grocery bags back from her grasp and walks past her. And she’s left staring at the horizon in the middle of the dirt road, only to huff and march off into a different direction.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Am I the only one who thinks Julia and Magnus butt heads? I think Julia and Magnus are actually very similar, and Julia doesn’t know how to handle it. She doesn’t want to get close to him so theres this weird disconnect. I'd love any feedback you guys have! I know its been awhile since I updated so I quickly wrote another chapter. Soon I'll have them reconcile and Julia will eventually tell Magnus about Angus.


End file.
